today, we will take an early look at what will be and what should be the foreign policy of the second obama administration in the middle east. we at the washington institute, for us this is just the beginning of a quite a number of event and undertakings that we will be producing. there will be transition papers on the key issues. sometimes by our sterling institute research staff, sometimes by outside scholars and practitioners that we have commissioned to take a look at specific topics -- in the next several weeks, we are putting together -- come together with some frequency here in person and in the cyberworld to focus on a discrete, individual topics. we begin the process with a more general discussion in which i and my two distinguished colleagues will examine the broader issues at stake in the middle east for a second obama administration. at this moment, let me just remind people ago you could please turn your cell phones off, but silent, but took lee off. we're broadcasting live on c- span. we have other esteemed members of the journalists world here with us. each of my collea